


The First Meeting

by orphan_account



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-15
Updated: 2013-05-15
Packaged: 2017-12-11 22:07:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,674
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/803778
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Jake and Rose have their first conversation...and it's about Dirk.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The First Meeting

**Author's Note:**

> This was written before the grimbark updates, so.

Predictably, when you and your friends met the four new arrivals, you each gravitated toward your kid guardians first. Well, apparently they were biologically your children? But you couldn’t think of Jade as anything other than your Grandma and pen pal. That just wasn’t going to happen.

But then everyone started mixing with everyone else. That’s when everyone started to surprise you. Roxy started sort of flirting with Dave. Dirk started sort of flirting with John. Jade and Jane were watching and laughing at the whole situation.

Which leaves you standing awkwardly by Rose.

She seems comfortable with the silence, but you aren’t. You need to talk about something, anything. It’s just that you don’t know anything about her, so you don’t know what she’d even want to talk about.

But she does seem to take after Dirk more than Roxy, so at least that gives you a starting point. You clear your throat somewhat awkwardly to get her attention.

“So. You don’t really act like Roxy.” It’s a bit lame, but it’s something.

Rose shakes her head slightly and you could swear you see the ghost of a smirk on her face. “I don’t have a lot in common with her, no.”

Well, you were hoping for a better response, but she doesn’t seem to be shutting you out or anything. Questions, then. Questions would get the conversation going. “Is Dave more like her, then? It kind of looks like it.”

That isn’t a lie. It looks like he and Roxy were enjoying their banter. You could swear Dave is flirting a little too, but if his relation to Dirk is any indication that’s probably just his sense of humor. Hitting on your alternate universe teen clone mother is ironic, right?

“Yes, he is. They’re both smarter than they act, for one.” That makes you laugh a little, which makes Rose smile. “I think they’ve started to realize how similar they are. It looks like they’re really hitting it off.”

You nod in agreement. “And what about Dirk and John?”

She turns her piercing stare back to you. “What about them?”

“Well…look!” She does. It takes you a few moments to find the right words. “They’re getting along famously, aren’t they?”

Rose cocks her head slightly and takes a moment to observe them. John is significantly shorter than Dirk (as are you and Jane), so he looks especially like an excitable child as they chat. John cocks his head toward Dave, and you guess he’s either talking about him or bringing up something he said.

After a moment, Rose hums thoughtfully. “John seems to get along with almost everyone. Even people who hate him tend to like him.”

You don’t doubt it. It sounds like she’s speaking from experience there. But… “Does everyone get along with him  _that_ well?”

A pause and a scrutinizing stare later, you just know she doesn’t see it. “Watch Dirk,” you say, determined to make her see what you’re seeing. “You see the way the corners of his mouth are turning up, just so?”

“He looks like he’s trying not to smile.”

“He is.” Meanwhile, you try not to frown. “Usually he just kinda smirks. He must have the hots for John.”

Rose starts staring at you again. You start wishing she wouldn’t do that. “You’re jealous, aren’t you?”

Her tone makes you think she’s teasing, but you bite your lip and look back at John and Dirk. Are you jealous of him? You haven’t had a chance to really properly talk with Dirk yet. Loopy candy shenanigans don’t count. You don’t know how he feels. Hell, you don’t even know how you feel. From where you’re standing, your relationship looks royally bumfucked either way though.

And that’s just Dirk. You don’t even want to think about Jane. Thinking about how you don’t want to think about Jane makes you think about Jane anyway though. Loopy candy shenanigans still don’t count. But if she really did feel that way all that time…oh golly. You’re a douche.

Before you know it, you’re telling Rose all of this. How Dirk liked you, and you thought he did but couldn’t quite tell, then Roxy told you Jane liked you, but Jane told you she didn’t, then Dirk told you he did, and you didn’t know how you felt but you got together with him anyway.

You told Rose how Dirk would always look like that around you, never Roxy or Jane, and you knew that was something reserved for you and you could tell he liked you quite a lot. You admitted that you were flattered but you still just didn’t know and it scared you so you ran, you tried to separate yourself from the problem until you could solve it, and you asked Roxy and Jane for help but Jane got sick of it.

That’s when you sucked in a sharp breath and internally kicked yourself.

“Sorry, you don’t want to hear all of this,” you say with an apologetic smile. You bite your lip to keep yourself from talking any more. That’s how you alienated Jane, and you’re not going to repeat a mistake.

So understandably, you’re confused when Rose responds with “No, I do.”

You give her a questioning look, and she seems to be thinking. But she raises an eyebrow and asks if there’s any more to the story before you figure out that’s what she wants.

“Oh, uh…not too much? I don’t know if you heard about how everyone sort of went dippy and…generally pretty colorful?” She nods, and you assume someone filled her in on that. Roxy, probably. “Well, that was when Jane told me she was in love with me, and Dirk broke up with me. He said I treated him like he didn’t have feelings, and…well, that’s not right. I was trying not to hurt his feelings. I just didn’t know what to tell him.”

In retrospect, you probably didn’t do the best job there. Ignoring him probably hurt him more than dragging out the breakup. That may or may not have been inevitable. Still, you wonder how you managed to come across like you didn’t even care.

Rose’s voice brought your thoughts back to the present situation. “You didn’t know what to say because you don’t know how you feel, is that right?”

You nodded, and then started talking again before you could help yourself. “Dirk is fantastic though! He’s my best bro! I don’t like anyone as much as I like him.”

“But you don’t love him.”

You sigh. “I don’t know.” You really don’t. You’d pick him over almost anyone. You know it’s wrong to think like that, but it’s true.

“Did you two do a lot of romantic things? I know you didn’t exactly have a lot of options, but did you go on dates and such?” Rose’s voice was taking on a kind of thoughtful tone, like someone trying to go through some elaborate scientific rigmarole in their head.

“I don’t know if exploring our planets could really count as dates? Most of the time it was sort of deadly, so I guess not.” You bit your lip and thought about it some more. “But he did try to play the dashing hero whenever he could, so I guess it could count?”

By that point you were surprised Rose wasn’t laughing. She was very obviously trying not to. You couldn’t see what was so amusing.

“Okay, so talk about the times Dirk was trying to be romantic. How did that make you feel? Awkward, or happy?”

You paused to really consider the question. “Flattered,” you said with a little hesitation, “but also a little guilty, because I…well, I don’t guess I need to repeat myself.”

After a moment of silence, she seemed to get that you weren’t going to elaborate. “Did you two never kiss?”

For some reason, that made you chuckle. “Oh, we did.” You guessed she would ask, so you decided to tell her about that too. “Kissing was…not all it’s cracked up to be, I think. It was okay, physically, at least when he wasn’t dead.” Holy smokes. That was a weird thing that just came out of your mouth. “I never saw stars or anything though.”

“So you probably don’t love him.” It was simple. But it was logical. It was probably true. Rose kept talking at you before you could deny it. “He’s your best friend and you love him in that sense, but if you don’t feel anything when you kiss him, there’s nothing there. Well, that or you’re just not interested in sex.”

You can’t help but let your eyes widen. How did she make the jump from kissing to sex? That…well, okay, she actually has a point there.

Holy shit, she may have hit the nail on the head.

“Wait, no, I’ve never been…” You trail off and clear your throat. It is a bit awkward to talk about this, after all. But at least she seems to understand. She nods and smirks at you, and that’s when she definitely starts to look like her father’s daughter.

(Holy hell, okay, you can’t think of these kids as your sons and daughters, that’s just way too weird.)

She places a hand on your shoulder then, and even though she’s a mite shorter than you it feels like she’s so much older and wiser. “Maybe you should separate love and sex in your mind, and then try to work out your feelings. And I’d suggest putting off conversations with Dirk and Jane until you’ve thought long and hard about it.”

You give her a nod and a smile in reply. Her hand slips back down to her side and you both slip back down into silence, though it feels less awkward this time. As you watch the others and their shenanigans, you realize you have a lot of thinking to do.

But at least you’re not royally bumfucked like you thought you were.


End file.
